LEAD 4013 Module 3 Ethics and Accountability Analysis Example

A Cross-Selling Target on Every Call: Ethics, Integrity and Accountability for a Servant-Leading Supervisor in a Credit Union

Student Name

American College of Education

LEAD4013: Strategic Servant Leadership

Module 3 Assignment

Instructor Name

October 26, 2026

Introduction

Servant leadership is sometimes caricatured as kindness without standards. This module tests that caricature against a real tension in my role as a contact center supervisor at a regional credit union. Senior management has introduced a goal that representatives offer a credit card, auto loan refinance or other product on at least three of every ten calls, with team results tied to supervisors' bonuses. The goal could help members, many of whom pay high rates elsewhere. It could also pressure representatives to push products members do not need, especially on calls from people who are upset about fraud or a death in the family. This paper analyzes the ethical risks, the demands of integrity and the meaning of accountability for a servant leader, and sets out how I will respond. The credit union and people described are composites.

Ethics: Whose Interests Come First?

The ethical question is whose interests a sales goal serves. A credit union is a cooperative owned by its members, which in principle aligns the institution's interests with theirs. A well-matched offer, such as refinancing a member's high-rate auto loan from another lender, serves the member. A badly matched offer, such as pitching a credit card to someone calling because their card was stolen and their account drained, serves the metric. Research on ethical leadership describes leaders who act appropriately themselves and who promote that conduct in followers through communication, reinforcement and the decisions they make (Brown et al., 2005). A goal that rewards offers regardless of fit reinforces the wrong conduct, whatever its intent.

The Servant Leader's Starting Point

Servant leadership adds a particular lens. Greenleaf's test asks whether those served, and the least privileged in society, benefit or at least are not further harmed (Greenleaf, 1977). Applied here, the people served include both representatives and members. A goal that pushes representatives to make offers they believe are wrong harms them as well as members, because it asks them to act against their own judgment. A servant leader therefore cannot simply pass the pressure down. Nor can she ignore the goal, since the credit union's financial health supports members too and the goal is legitimate in principle.

Integrity: Matching Words and Deeds

Integrity in leadership has been studied as behavioral integrity, the perceived alignment between what a manager says and what the manager does (Simons, 2002). My team has heard me say for two years that members come first and that representatives should never rush or pressure someone in distress. If I now coach them to hit three offers in ten on every call type, my words and deeds will diverge, and the trust built over two years will erode quickly. For a servant leader, integrity is not only about avoiding wrongdoing; it is about whether the team can still believe what the leader says. The response to the goal must therefore be consistent with what I have told the team, or I must explain openly why my position has changed.

Accountability: The Part Often Missed

Servant leadership is not the absence of standards. A widely cited synthesis lists stewardship, taking responsibility for the larger institution, and providing direction among the servant leader's characteristics (van Dierendonck, 2011). Accountability runs in three directions here. I am accountable to senior management for a legitimate goal and to the credit union's members for how it is pursued. My representatives are accountable for their performance, including the quality of their offers. And I am accountable to the team for protecting them from pressure that would compromise their integrity. Servant leadership does not let me avoid any of these, including the uncomfortable conversation with a representative who makes few offers because he finds it awkward, not because the offers would be wrong.

My Response

I will respond in four steps. First, I will define what a good offer looks like with the team: one made after the member's main need is resolved, based on something the member has said or that the account shows, and never on calls about fraud, death or financial hardship. Second, I will ask senior management to exclude those call types from the offer count and to measure acceptance rate and complaints alongside offer rate, presenting data from a two-week pilot showing that well-matched offers were accepted far more often. Third, I will coach representatives individually on recognizing real opportunities, including those who avoid offers out of discomfort, because holding them accountable for legitimate goals is part of developing them. Fourth, I will audit five offer calls per representative each month for fit and tone, and recognize good offers as well as good service. I will explain all four steps to the team at once, so they hear the reasoning and know exactly what is expected of them.

What the Pilot Showed

Before taking the proposal to senior management, my team ran a two-week pilot on its own calls. Representatives made offers only after resolving the member's main need, only when something in the call or account suggested a real fit and never on fraud, bereavement or hardship calls. The team made offers on about 22% of calls, below the 30% target, but members accepted 31% of those offers, compared with about 9% for the center as a whole under the new goal. Complaints mentioning sales pressure fell to zero on our team while rising elsewhere. The figures are small and from one team, but they make an argument management can hear: fewer, better offers produced more new loans and cards than more offers made indiscriminately. The pilot turned an ethical concern into a business case.

If Senior Management Says No

If management refuses to change the goal, I face a harder choice. I would continue to coach representatives toward well-matched offers and decline to pressure them on sensitive calls, accept that my team might miss the target and my bonus might fall and document my concerns in writing to my manager and, if needed, to the credit union's compliance officer. A servant leader can accept personal cost to protect followers and those they serve; what she cannot do is quietly comply while telling the team something different.

Lessons

Three lessons emerge. Ethics in servant leadership begins with asking whose interests a decision serves, including the least powerful. Integrity means the team can trust that the leader's actions match her words, which matters most when pressure tempts a gap. And accountability is part of service, not opposed to it: holding people to legitimate standards develops them, while protecting them from illegitimate ones honors them. A fourth lesson is practical: evidence persuades where principle alone may not.

Conclusion

The cross-selling goal tests whether servant leadership can be both caring and accountable. Applied carefully, it can: by defining good offers, excluding sensitive calls, proposing better measures, coaching and auditing for fit and being willing to bear personal cost rather than compromise integrity. Module 4 applies systems thinking to the same goal, tracing how a single metric can ripple through the contact center and beyond.

References

Brown, M. E., Treviño, L. K., & Harrison, D. A. (2005). Ethical leadership: A social learning perspective for construct development and testing. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 97(2), 117-134. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.obhdp.2005.03.002

Greenleaf, R. K. (1977). Servant leadership: A journey into the nature of legitimate power and greatness. Paulist Press.

Simons, T. (2002). Behavioral integrity: The perceived alignment between managers' words and deeds as a research focus. Organization Science, 13(1), 18-35. https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.13.1.18.543

van Dierendonck, D. (2011). Servant leadership: A review and synthesis. Journal of Management, 37(4), 1228-1261. https://doi.org/10.1177/0149206310380462